10 Questions that have tormented us since childhood, but that science has already answered us

The “eternal” questions about which came first, the chicken or the egg; what color is the zebra; what are those spots that appear before the eyes after someone looks directly into the light of a lamp, and why cats keep staring at nothing, has probably been around most of us. But what few know is that science has already unraveled many of these questions.

O awesome.club decided to enumerate the answers to the questions that have always troubled us since our childhood. And who could have imagined that the explanations would be so simple?

For a long time, scientists couldn’t determine which came first: the egg or an ancient animal (the ancestor of the chicken), but in the end, the answer was found. From the point of view of Darwin’s theory and modern biologists, the egg came first. The fact is that the specimen that over the years turned into a chicken could not have appeared on its own, because the germination of a life takes place in the egg cell.

Over time, the ancient bird “turned” into a chicken. And these changes took place in the egg, in the embryo stage. A chicken hatched from that egg, and soon laid a chicken egg.

So the egg of an ancient animal appeared before it, and the egg with a chicken in it appeared before the first chicken came into being.

These are called “blind spots”. When bright light shines directly into our eyes, an excess of temporal tension is produced in the photoreceptors of the retina. That is, for a short time, they cannot react to anything else, and after recovering, they reproduce the light that we saw with the help of these “points”.

Scientists recommend closing one eye when moving from a dark room to a bright room. Thus, we prepare for a sudden change in lighting, and the “blind spots” will disappear faster. It is said that this is why pirates covered an eye with cloth.

In fact, the zebra is a black horse with white stripes. Stripes appear due to a genetic process of selective pigmentation; the main pigment is black, and the white streaks are the result of its absence.

It was British scientists who discovered why a zebra has this coloring. In his opinion, white and black stripes are the ones that least attract flies. In the past, biologists also formulated the version that stripes scared predators, but this theory has not been confirmed.

Some people believe that cats stare into space because they are able to see ghosts. In fact, if your pet stays like this for a while, it’s because it’s getting ready for bed. These animals spend most of their time sleeping.

And if a cat looks in a certain direction, it is very likely that he is hearing a sound or smelling a scent that we cannot perceive: felines have more developed sense organs than humans. Therefore, the cat remains motionless, waiting to see if the movement or sound that caught its attention will be repeated.

In the skin of a chameleon there are chromatophore cells that contain grains of different pigments. These cells occupy a large space, so the pigments can be evenly distributed over all of them. And when the chameleon needs to change color, the cells compress and the “colors” are pushed to the center of them.

It should be noted that the shades of the range of black, brown, red and yellow are created by the chromatophores located in the outer layer of the skin, and the shades of blue in the deeper layers.

Human genes are divided into dominant (strong) and recessive (fragile). If, for example, a blue-eyed child is born to brown-eyed parents, there is nothing surprising about that, it just means that the parents have recessive blue-eyed genes.

And if we are very similar to any of our distant ancestors, it means that in previous generations these genes “lost” and were recessive, but now they are dominant.

In fact, it often happens that in a family, one child is very similar to the mother and the other to the father. This happens because of gene splitting: siblings get a combination of different genes.

In fact, the feeling of well-being after waking up doesn’t just depend on how many hours you’ve slept. But if during the day you ate heavy foods, drank too much coffee or energy drinks, drank too little water, or exercised too little, you may feel tired after sleeping, even if your sleep has been prolonged.

Also, a long sleep won’t help you rest if you go to bed late. The body cannot start synthesizing melatonin in time, which can lead to a variety of disorders. It is better to go to bed before midnight and always at the same time (the tolerance for this is one hour). And certainly, doing some sport can give you a feeling of well-being after sleeping, even if you slept for less than 8 hours.

Long daytime sleep can also cause fatigue. If you want to rest during the day, you should take a nap between 1 pm and 3 pm, and for no more than 30 minutes; during this time, you will recover and rest. Sleeping too much during the day is harmful, as after the onset of the deep sleep phase, it is more difficult to wake up, which is why we feel tired after having slept a lot during the day.

According to American scientists, the perception of time is subjective and depends on the speed of the brain. When we are young, the brain perceives and processes information more quickly. So it seems that time passes slowly. But when we are adults, our brain perceives everything that happens more slowly. And that’s why time flies faster.

The French philosopher Paul Janet was also convinced that our subjective experience of time is based on a comparison: mentally, we compare the length of a month or a season with the lapse of years already lived.

To get rid of this feeling of “transience”, psychologists advise meditating, trying something new, traveling, journaling, or making friends outside the circle of usual communication.

Déjà vu it is the feeling that we have already experienced a situation, that we have already seen a certain landscape or that we have already been in a certain place. Freud believed that it was the trace of a forgotten memory that traumatized us or of a very strong secret desire.

But modern neuroscientists believe that it is a short-term dysfunction in the work of various parts of the brain, which can be caused by stress, tiredness or alcohol consumption. The brain is confused and considers that the new impressions are already known to it. Also, the situation may seem repetitive when it is similar to some events stored in memory.

And if you experience the effect of déjà vu then you should consult a doctor, as this can be a sign of serious illness.

Scientists believe that laughter first appeared around 2 to 4 million years ago and looked like short, forceful exhalations. When we laugh, 80 facial muscles intervene in the process immediately. Laughter is a motor act that causes many areas of the brain to work together. Several components are said to act: contraction of the diaphragm and vocalization, as well as joy and a feeling of “getting the joke”.

Laughter can also be caused by other emotions, such as fright and fear. But it is not for nothing that they say that laughter prolongs life and has a good effect on health; according to scientists, 15 minutes of laughter can burn as many calories as a medium-sized chocolate bar.

In addition, laughter enhances creativity, helps in the treatment of asthma and bronchitis, and even affects the sense of well-being of cancer patients.

Have you ever asked any of these questions? Is there another question you’ve already asked that I still can’t find an answer to? Comment!